A Digital Life and Work in Louisiana

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As much as 2014 was an annus horribilis, 2015 was its counter. My appointment at the Office of Research & Economic Development has been a great opportunity for me. The team here is solid, professional and dedicated to the mission of our group. I find that my experiences as a creative artist, computer researcher, teacher and administrator all come to play in addressing our day-to-day challenges as well as our long term strategic needs. I’m able to continue composing, and my graduate students continue to make good progress on their degrees. And my life with Kathy remains solid and filled with love.

I have been blessed to see my children grow and mature, recognizing their passions and seeing them reach towards their goals. A summer road trip brought much of this into careful focus. While their roads are markedly different than the ones I chose, I am grateful that they have been able to see their future-selves at an earlier point in life. That doesn’t mean the roads are smoother or safer, nor will I be surprised if their routes change along the way. But I see true joy in my children’s faces (and in our faces), and pray that they will be as fortunate as I in finding a life in the arts.

Lifelong stresses remain: my mother living through Alzheimers, my father her caretaker, the joys and pains of home ownership, the joys and pains of parenthood. My siblings and I grow older and our bodies grow older too. These will not be easy years to come. But for the first time in several years, I sense a personal happiness in everyone and in myself. I have found nachas and solace, comfort when things go wrong, joy when things go right.

Indeed, 2015 was a much better year.

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As we come to the end of 2014, I am between extremes of emotion. On one hand, it has been an annus horribilis. Health issues have been a major concern for my parents. There are times when I wish I could just pop over and lend a hand. But living halfway across the country leaves me unable to help in any immediate way. This year also was a time of transition for many of us in our work and careers, which whether planned or unplanned raises anxieties about what the future will hold. And my aunt’s losing battle with leukemia this summer was a devastating shock to us all. It put particular stress on my sister and cousins who were with her through her entire struggle.

And yet, with so much tsouris, I have found great solace in the strength, love and compassion of my family, friends and colleagues. My wife and children, parents, brother and sister, aunts and uncles, cousins, and friends old and new showed great personal resolve through it all, for which I am humbled and grateful. From all of this has come a renewed optimism for the year ahead. That despite the inevitable struggles we will face in 2015, there will be strength and support from family and friends no matter the circumstances or distance.

Although my instinct is to say “goodbye and good riddance” to 2014, I prefer the words of Robert Burns. We should not forget our past. We should remember and cherish our family and friends. We will be there in their time of need, just as they will be there for us, for auld lang syne.

And there’s a hand, my trusty fiere!and gie’s a hand o’ thine!
And we’ll tak’ a right gude-willie waught,
for auld lang syne.

— Robert Burns

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I certainly sympathize with the author’s concerns. I have often found myself teaching algebra and calculus concepts when I’ve needed my students to understand concepts in music, and especially in the physics of sound. But the idea that students should not have to take algebra if it impedes their educational process is fundamentally flawed.

This only perpetuates what I call the C. P. Snow myth, that the arts/humanities and the sciences are so separate and distinct that they have no connection or correlation to one another, that they can and should be studied separately, and that we shouldn’t expect people to be able to understand both. The myth is just that, a myth.

The challenge we have is in the way we teach Algebra in high school, and math in general. New technologies can help make math more visual and relevant. We must approach its teaching from our 21st century perspective, with real world problems and their computational implications. If we really want to solve the problem of math illiteracy, we need to address its teaching, and not vilify the subject.

To paraphrase JFK, we study math not because it is easy, but because it is hard.

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In light of Steve Jobs‘ announcement that he is stepping down as CEO of Apple, the Wall Street Journal put together some of his best quotes. There are two that really resonate with me.

On creativity and design:

“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or they have thought more about their experiences than other people.”

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There are times when a particular event becomes a landmark in one’s life. Sometimes, we know when they occur (marriage, birth of a child), and sometimes we only realize their importance years later. Yesterday, was one of those days, and it game me a chance to reflect on my career as a composer, a teacher, and an administrator, all at the same time.

Yesterday, we broke ground on a new building for LSU’s campus, the Louisiana Digital Media Center. The LDMC will be home to CCT (and the AVATAR Initiative) as well as to EA’s North American Testing Center for quality assurance. This building has been “in the works” for at least 4 years, and represents the efforts of a lot of people at the university, city/parish, state and federal levels. There are too many people to thank directly, but you know who you are. For everyone’s effort, I am extremely grateful.

This building represents a vision for how a university can bridge teaching and research with economic development. It goes far beyond just workforce training for specific industries. It’s an environment where new ideas can bubble up out of casual conversations in the hall or over coffee, ideas that can lead to remarkable innovations that make our lives better.

The LDMC opens a new chapter for the CCT, and in the evolution of our AVATAR Initiative in digital media, fulfilling a vision that my late colleague Michael Daugherty and I shared when we started the Music & Art Digital Studio (MADstudio) back in 1995. I spent a lot of time thinking about Michael, our first projects, our collaborations, and our wild fantasies of how we would have an iconic place on campus that would rival the best digital media research centers in the country.

Yesterday shows that to realize big things, sometimes you need a few wild fantasies to get you on your way. To everyone who joined in on these wild dreams, thank you.

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I had tweeted about this earlier, but I wanted to add a few thoughts about this ruling. Basically, the Supreme Court decided that under the Bayh-Dole act, universities could not universally force its faculty and researchers to cede all rights to any invention they may have developed or derived as a result of federally funded research. This is truly good news for us faculty as it protects our rights as creators under the context of federal patent law, that being “rights in an invention belong to an inventor.”

Universities have long struggled with the relationship between academic research and the commercialization of the resulting research product. The case of Gatorade and the University of Florida is perhaps the starting point for the typical approach many universities now have regarding patentable research. Generally, the approach is “we (the university) own everything, even if you create something outside of your research.” This ruling changes that, and will force universities to be more pragmatic with their policies. But it will also allow university faculty to have more control over their inventions and to be more entrepreneurial (to the benefit of all).

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One of my graduate students developed a great installation piece called “Bugs in the System.” It uses sensors, cameras, microphones, an Arduino board, and these really cool electronic bugs (you have to see these!). He did it as part of Jesse Allison’s augmented instruments class last semester. Here’s a link to his online documentation.

Huel Perkins was one of the first administrators I met at LSU. He was Associate Vice Chancellor when I arrived in 1988, and we met through our mutual association with the Fulbright program. Over the years, we hardly ever met in an office or at a meeting. Yet, every time I felt I needed his … Continue reading →

The LSU School of Music has recently implemented a new ticketing policy that is a significant change from past practice, one that regrettably has put more financial burden on students. Last year, concerts in the Recital Hall were free (with a few exceptions such as Christopher O’Riley, and Hot Summer Nights concerts), and all music … Continue reading → […]

It’s been quite a start to the new academic year. Between getting all of our students enrolled, dealing with academic issues, launching a new ticketing system and policy for the school, not to mention three days of Hurricane Isaac. But with all of that said, we’ve had a great start to the year. On Sunday, … Continue reading →

I must admit that it feels a bit strange to be in my new office at the LSU School of Music. For the past 24 years, I’ve been shuttling around LSU’s campus wearing different hats: as composer, teacher, researcher, software engineer, grant writer, collaborator, program administrator, center director. As director of the Cultural Computing focus … Continue rea […]